New Deal Around For 3 Months!

Last updated : 27 January 2007 By Bournemouth Co-Ordinator

In an article in the Bournemouth Evening Echo, it is being claimed that an alternative deal to buy the Club and the Ground have been around for 3 months.

Former Cherries player, Brian O'Donnell, acting as spokesperson for the mystery Dorset business man, is quoted as saying: "It has been reported that the consortium is the only deal on the table. It's not and it never has been. We have put in an offer to Structadene, the owners, to buy the stadium and we are in talks with Abdul Jaffer about buying the club thereafter. We didn't really want to go public at this time, but felt we had to let the fans know that there is another offer on the table. We are working hard to try and make it happen within a matter of weeks. It is either done in a matter of weeks, or the deal is off. The aim is to buy back all the assets which have been leased or sold on to other parties and put it all under one owner. We feel that would strengthen the club and would give us the opportunity to finally take the club forward. We will be making offers for the rest of the assets in due course, but first and foremost, we must acquire the stadium and go from there. The stadium is paramount. It is very difficult to run the club if you don't own the assets and that would be a handicap to any club. The deal has not been as easy as we'd like it to have been. We have walked away from the table a couple of times because we felt we couldn't put the deal together with the club. Perhaps Abdul felt that we were no longer interested, but we have had lots of co-operation from the club. We've had this deal simmering for three months. There have been setbacks and disagreements, but the offer is now on the table and is in the hands of Structadene".

O'Donnell also went on to stress that the Dean Court site would remain as a Football Stadium.